With Dreams Untold
by EveLGW
Summary: I wanted to write something fluffy and ended up with an angst-feast. Oh, well ... (GSR 'cause Geek Love Rules! :-) Chapter 7 (final chapter) added.
1. Chapter 1

Title: With Dreams Untold  
Author: Eve (little_grey_woman42@yahoo.de)  
Keywords: GSR, fluff, angst, angst and did I mention angst?  
Pairing(s): hmm ... let me see ... nope, better read it for yourself :-) You won't believe me anyway ...  
Rating: PG (I guess)  
Disclaimer: Not mine. 'sigh'  
Author's notes: Okay, this story here is odd. And probably (hopefully only) at first quite confusing. Just like me (except for the "at first"-part :-).   
  
With Dreams Untold (1/7)  
by Eve (little_grey_woman42@yahoo.de)  
  
~~*~~  
  
He didn't hear the footsteps approach the other side of the door, didn't hear the knocking behind him. One moment he stood with his back to the door, the next everything went black.  
  
~~*~~  
  
When he opened his eyes again he found himself lying face down on the cold floor of the morgue and had the feeling that somebody - somebody with a baseball bat and an attitude - might have mistaken the back of his head with a ball.   
  
It hurt like hell.  
  
He gingerly touched the rapidly forming bump with his hand. 'At least it's not bleeding,' he thought and pushed himself slowly into a sitting position. Hearing somebody open the door behind him he winced when he heard a concerned "Grissom!" that was way too loud for his increasing headache.   
  
"Yes, Nick?" he said and looked up into the worried face that belonged to the younger CSI who had by now walked around his sitting form to face him.   
  
"What happened?"  
  
Grissom thankfully accepted the offered hand and stood up but had to close his eyes again when he was suddenly hit by a wave of dizziness. He lifted his glasses and rubbed his eyes in an attempt to ease the pressure behind them and to clear his gaze.  
  
"Gris?"  
  
When he didn't answer right away, he said: "I'll go and call a doctor."   
  
"No, Nick, it's okay. I'm just a bit dizzy," Grissom tried to calm him down and lowered himself on one of the chairs.  
  
"What happened?" Nick asked again and pulled a flashlight out of his pocket.  
  
"I guess somebody opened the door and I was in the way." He winced when the light shone into his eyes.  
  
"Contraction on both sides seems to be normal. How many fingers am I holding up?"   
  
"Three."   
  
"Okay."  
  
He sighed. "I told you I was fine. Really."   
  
"You actually scared me there for a sec. Whoever pushed those doors open without looking first should be arrested - where is this person anyway?"   
  
"I don't know. And to tell the truth, I don't care either. Nothing serious happened."  
  
"Still ..."  
  
"Just leave it alone, Nick."  
  
"Okay. But if I found the person by accident ..."   
  
"Whatever," Grissom said, feeling too tired to keep arguing.  
  
"So, are you finished here?" Nick asked, concern still apparent on his face.  
  
"Finished?" Grissom replied and stood up, now feeling a bit dazed. "Yeah, sure."   
  
"Perhaps you should sit down a bit longer, Gris. You really don't -"   
  
"I'm fine, Nick. Stop mothering me already," he said, the words coming out harsher than he'd wanted them to. Nick took a step back and held out his hands appeasingly.  
  
"Hey, I'm sorry that -"  
  
Grissom closed his eyes and tried to fight another wave of dizziness by taking deep breaths that were supposed to be calming but only seem to increase his by now pounding headache.  
  
"No, *I'm* sorry," he interrupted him. "Yes, I've hit my head but no I don't think I've got a concussion. I'll be fine, Nick, really."   
  
"Sure boss, if you say so," Nick answered, still not completely convinced but at the same time aware that he couldn't force him to do anything he didn't want to. "Just one more thing - please take it slow today. I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of one of Sara's death stares, okay?" he said with a grin.   
  
Suddenly Nick seemed to remember something and smacked his hand against his forehead, adding: "Oh man, I actually forgot to tell you why I came here - she's waiting for you at Greg's lab. The test results are in."  
  
Before Grissom could ask him what test results he was referring to, Nick's pager chirped up. He glanced at the small display and cursed softly under his breath. "They need me down at the garage. The car of the hit-and-run suspect has finally arrived." He was already half way through the door when he turned around again and said: "Don't throw anything at me but I still think you should go and see a doctor about that nasty bump at the back of your head."   
  
"If it gets worse I'll do it, Nick. Okay? Now *go*."  
  
Nick grinned. "Okay. Take care, Gris," he said and was gone.   
  
~~*~~ 


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer, header etc. in part 1.  
  
~~*~~  
  
With Dreams Untold (2/7)  
by Eve (little_grey_woman42@yahoo.de)  
  
~~*~~  
  
Nobody seemed to be surprised to see him at work although he wasn't supposed to show until the day after tomorrow. But he was too preoccupied with other things to really wonder about it. As he slowly walked towards the lab still not knowing what case Nick had spoken about, he was trying to fight the dizziness that still hadn't left him completely. He shook his head in an attempt to clear his vision but winced simultaneously at the pain that accompanied the sudden jerky motion.   
  
The walk took him much longer than usual and he breathed a sigh of relief when he finally stood in front of the door to Greg's sanctuary. He was just about to open it when he spotted him and Sara through the small window-pane and froze right in his tracks.   
  
Greg, wearing one of his most hideous shirts underneath his white lab coat and sporting something that could barely be described with the words "new haircut", was smiling happily and seemed to be completely at ease. Sara stood directly behind him, one hand on his shoulder, leaning slightly towards him, looking intently at the screen. Grissom felt a slight pang of something he didn't want to recognise and quickly pushed it away.   
  
But then he frowned. There was something about the scene before him ... Grissom watched Greg point at something on the monitor, saw him make a remark too quiet for him to catch through the closed door.  
  
But he did catch her reaction - carefree, bright and content laughter.   
  
Sara was laughing. Not timidly smiling, or sarcastically grinning but laughing.  
  
That was when he looked at her, *really* looked at her, and noticed that something was different.   
  
She looked happier and ... young. So young.  
  
The telltale circles underneath her eyes, the haughty look that she'd acquired some weeks ago on one of their more gruesome cases and that just wouldn't go away, both results of too much overtime and a job that was eating her up, were gone. She appeared to be healthier, more alive than he believed she had looked since he had first met her so many years ago.   
  
He wondered what might have happened that had such an impact on her life, that resulted in such a change.   
  
And how something like that happened right before his eyes without him realising it.   
  
Was he so out of touch with her that he really hadn't noticed?   
  
It couldn't possibly have happened during the few days he'd been gone, could it?  
  
Grissom was aware that over the course of the last few weeks he'd slowly but surely withdrawn himself more and more from the cases they were working on, and finally even took a few days off to see if the members of his team were ready to work completely on their own.   
  
He didn't know whether the surgery would help and if not, he wasn't planning on coming back.  
  
So not knowing how much longer he'd be able to do his job, he'd decided that the least he could do was to make sure that he wouldn't be missed when he had to resign.   
  
But when his gaze focused on the small window again he wondered whether he really would be able to just turn his back on his team and walk away.   
  
From a team that had grown into a kind of family despite his resistance.   
  
And from Sara, who almost seemed to radiate, to glow as if something, somebody had switched on a light in her.   
  
He turned his attention back towards the two people behind the door. Again he was overcome with a feeling of unease, with something he couldn't place. Grissom saw how Greg faced her, saw the way she smiled back at him and realised how close she was standing to him, her hand still on his shoulder.   
  
And right then he noticed something else.  
  
'No. It can't be.'  
  
Totally taken aback and completely confused he unconsciously took a step back. He turned around and before he realised what he was doing he walked hastily down the hallway, all the time staying close to the wall to steady himself, not caring where his steps would carry him.   
  
But no matter how much distance he tried to put between himself and the lab, he still wasn't able to get the haunting image out of his head - Sara's hand on Greg's shoulder, a golden wedding band on her finger softly twinkling in the harsh artificial light.  
  
~~*~~ 


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer, header etc. in part 1.  
  
~~*~~  
  
With Dreams Untold (3/7)  
by Eve (little_grey_woman42@yahoo.de)  
  
~~*~~  
  
When he became aware of his surroundings again he found himself near his office. Although his headache was slowly easing he decided that it would probably be best if he just packed his things and went home. He didn't belong there anyway, at least not until the day after tomorrow.  
  
'I don't belong here ...' He was surprised at the wave of sadness that swept through him as he wondered about where his place would be when he finally had to go. He had actually managed to make himself redundant. But that's what he had wanted to achieve, right?   
  
Right.   
  
Then the image of Sara's golden wedding band flashed again up before his inner eye and he wondered whether the price he had made himself pay for his team's and his own independence might turn out to be too much for him.  
  
Deeply occupied with his own thoughts he didn't notice Warrick until he nearly ran into him.   
  
"Gris, I was just about to page you," the younger man addressed him. "Is everything all right? You don't look so good, man."  
  
"I'm fine."   
  
"You sure? You look pretty much shaken."  
  
He nearly laughed out loud at those words. Shaken. His whole world just turned upside down. Shaken was definitely the understatement of the century.   
  
"Daddy!!!"   
  
Grissom heard a high-pitched voice call from the other end of the hallway. He turned towards the source of the noise and saw a child, not much older than two and a half years, run down the corridor as quickly as his short legs would carry him.   
  
Out of the corner of his eye he saw Warrick smile and when he turned around in order to ask him whether he knew who the boy belonged to, he watched Warrick squat down and open his arms wide. When the toddler flung himself at him, the tall man laughed and nearly fell flat on his back.  
  
"Hey, little rascal, I missed you!" he heard Warrick say while he engulfed the small boy completely in his embrace.   
  
"Daddy! I found you!" the boy said proudly with shining brown eyes and a big grin on his face.   
  
"Yeah, you did. Did you came here all on your own or did you bring mommy with you?"   
  
"Noooo, daddy. Mommy took me. She's there," he said and turned around to point down the hallway.   
  
Grissom followed his outstretched arm, and breathed a sigh of relief when he spotted a familiar face walking through the crowd at the end of the hallway.   
  
"Catherine!" Grissom said and started to walk towards her only to be nearly run over by the small boy.   
  
"Mommy!!!" he yelled down the corridor and Grissom watched with disbelief and fascination as the boy ran directly into Catherine's waiting arms.  
  
~~*~~  
  
  
  
  
Author's notes II: Btw - the title of the story is from a song by the Platters - "Twilight Time" :-) 


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer, header etc. in part 1.  
  
~~*~~  
  
With Dreams Untold (4/7)  
by Eve (little_grey_woman42@yahoo.de)  
  
~~*~~  
  
Too surprised and shocked to process what he was seeing, he found himself completely speechless and continued to watch the scene that took place right before his eyes.   
  
Catherine picked up the small child and hugged him close to her while Warrick walked up to them. When he reached them he ruffled the boy's hair and bend slightly down to kiss Catherine on her temple. She caressed his cheek with her free hand and for a moment they seemed to be lost in each other's gaze.   
  
'They look so happy,' was the first thing that came to Grissom's mind after he had somehow managed to sort through his still jumbled thoughts. When he found his voice again, he said "Catherine, what -" before he faltered, again at a loss for words. But it had been already enough to make the couple in front of him aware of their surroundings. They turned around and started to walk towards him.   
  
"I know that we're too late, Gil and I'm sorry. Although we were scheduled for one of your famous tours around your little lab of horrors, little Billy here," she looked at the boy on her arm who presently buried his face into her shoulder, "decided to conduct one of his famous experiments."  
  
"William Gilbert Brown, what did you do this time?" Warrick asked the boy sternly.  
  
Catherine sighed.   
  
"Well, *somebody*," she began and looked pointedly at Warrick, "forgot to screw the tube of toothpaste shut and left it on the rim of the sink - *again*."   
  
Warrick winced visibly and suddenly father and son wore sheepish expressions Grissom found to be strikingly similar.   
  
"The bathroom floor again?"  
  
"The bathroom floor, the bathroom walls, the outside of the bathtub, you name it. You know, it's really amazing how much of the inside of a bathroom a small kid can cover in such a short period of time with the content of a single tube of toothpaste."  
  
Warrick reached out for his son and took him from Catherine, looked him in the eyes and said: "Well, I guess we've got lots of cleaning up to do when I get home, little fella."   
  
"You bet you do," Catherine said. That made clear she turned around and faced Grissom: "So, Gil, I guess Billy has to wait another week until he can get the grand tour, won't he?"   
  
"But Mommy, I wanna see the bugs now," Billy wined.   
  
"No, Billy, we already talked about that in the car, didn't we?"   
  
The boy looked down and pouted.   
  
"We're too late for you to see the bugs now and we're also almost too late for kindergarten. So, if your Uncle Gil has time you can see them next week. *But* if you like to," she said teasingly and waited until she caught her son's gaze again, "you can give him your present now."   
  
The boy's face lit up and he struggled out of his father's arms who put him quickly down. Catherine handed him something out of her small backpack and when Billy turned around, Grissom could see that he was holding something between the palms of his small hands. Billy tugged awkwardly with his hands still closed over the mysterious object at Grissom's trousers who took that as his cue to squat down in front of him. Billy smiled openly at him and said: "This is for you." He opened his palms and held out a lumpy, red unidentifiable thing.   
  
Grissom took it and was surprised at its weight.   
  
It was a stone.   
  
A stone that someone had painted red and covered with black dots. The dots were irregular in size and colour and obviously painted by an inexperienced hand. Grissom assumed that the boy had drawn them and turned the stone around. He did a double take when he discovered a grinning smiley-face on one of the sides.   
  
"I made it. Lidsy helped me with the face and the red but I did *all* the dots."   
  
Grissom looked at the hopeful-looking face and said the only thing he could think of:   
  
"Thank you very much."   
  
He was rewarded with another bright smile and Catherine ruffled her son's curly hair affectionately. "See honey, I told you he would like it." Her son looked up at her and then turned his attention towards Grissom once again.   
  
"Will you put it in one of your boxes on the walls?"   
  
'Boxes? Why would I want to put a red stone ...'   
  
Grissom took again a look at the item in his hand and felt the proverbial light bulb turn itself on. He looked over the rim of his glasses and said seriously: "Well, I think this truly magnificent specimen of a ladybug deserves a box completely for itself."   
  
Again he had obviously somehow managed to say exactly the right thing because Billy was beaming at him. Grissom looked up at Catherine and saw her mouth a silent "Thank you" followed by a smile.  
  
~~*~~ 


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer, header etc. in part 1.  
  
~~*~~  
  
With Dreams Untold (5/7)  
by Eve (little_grey_woman42@yahoo.de)  
  
~~*~~  
  
After the small family had left, Grissom found himself still unable to fully comprehend what was happening. His now again pounding headache made it hard for him to concentrate, hard to form any clear thoughts at all. Everything just seemed to be so completely out of place.   
  
No, that wasn't quite right.   
  
*He* was the one who was out of place.  
  
Grissom had been looking for a room to be alone in order to sort through his muddled thoughts when he found himself in front of the break room. With now both Nick and Warrick down at the garage, Greg at the lab and Catherine and Billy on their way out he'd figured it would be as good as any other place. He'd just stepped inside and closed the door behind him when he heard somebody open it again.   
  
"Hey, I hoped to find you down here," Grissom heard a familiar voice behind him.  
  
'I can run, but I can't hide. At least not from her,' he thought, aware of the fact that now he obviously wouldn't be able to avoid having the conversation he dreaded most since he saw her at the lab.   
  
Not wanting to face her, he lowered his head and kept his back towards the door. He heard the faint noise of her footsteps and startled when her arms sneaked around his torso, when she hugged him close to her.  
  
"Where have you been? I've paged you some time ago and Nick just told me that he found you at the morgue. But you never came down to the lab," Sara said softly and rested her chin on his shoulder.  
  
"I ... came across something -" he told her hesitantly, wondering what made her act this way. He expected her to start laughing at him and turn it into a joke any minute now. But she didn't. And instead of trying to break her hold on him, he felt himself involuntarily and almost naturally lean into her embrace.  
  
"- and you lost track of time, I suppose." He knew she was smiling by now. "Some things never chance, Gris, don't they?" She loosened her hold on him and he instantly missed her warmth. He felt her slide around his unmoving form only to stop when she stood right in front of him, still close enough to touch. "Why don't I brief you about Greg's findings and then we get out of here? We still have to buy some stuff for tonight."  
  
"What about tonight?" he said, slowly raising his head until he faced her. She looked just the way she did when he'd spotted her through the window, only now she was standing so much closer, watching him intently, openly, and he realised ... He suddenly found it hard to breath and struggled to get air past the rapidly forming lump in his throat.  
  
"You promised me to cook us dinner tonight, remember?" Sara asked him, her hand resting on his shirt, right over the place where his heart was beating frantically.  
  
"Us?" he asked, completely puzzled.  
  
"Yeah, us. You, me, candles, wine, your famous vegetarian lasagne ..."  
  
"What?" he croaked, not believing what she was saying. Was she implying that they had a date? A candlelight dinner? But what about Greg?  
  
When she spoke again he realised that he must have asked the last question out loud.  
  
"Greg? Oh, come on Gris, I thought we agreed on having a day off, a day completely to ourselves. I know we're supposed to be working on our social skills - and you're doing great by the way - but this was supposed to be *our* night. Besides, Greg told me that he and his fiancée have already other plans."  
  
"Fiancée?"  
  
"Samantha Jennings? Tall, blond hair, BA in physics and biology?"  
  
Grissom felt as if somebody had - again - pulled the floor away from underneath his feet. His head was suddenly spinning and another wave of dizziness rolled over him as he swayed slightly and held his head.  
  
Sara grasped his arm and steadied him, concern etched deeply into her features. She led him to a chair in the corner where she made him sit down and gently ran her hand over the back of his head.  
  
"Nick told me that you bumped your head earlier this evening, but he also told me that he checked if there were any signs for a concussion and *promised* me that everything was all right. But now I'm not so sure ..."  
  
She crouched down in front of him, moved her hand away from the back of his head and gently cupped his cheek.   
  
Another situation, similar but at the same time so much different from this one flashed up before his inner eye. '"Chalk."'   
  
He closed his eyes when he felt the coolness of her ring come in contact with his flushed skin.  
  
When he opened his eyes again, he just looked at the beautiful woman in front of him, looked directly into her caring eyes and silently thanked whoever the person was that had the honour to be her husband, thanked him for giving her back what he believed had been lost to her forever.  
  
As he hesitantly covered her small hand on his cheek with his own, he felt her gentleness touch something deep inside of him. Touch a place he had believed to be long buried, forgotten, gone. And even though it hurt, right at that moment he was glad, so very glad that he still had her friendship, still had her in his life.  
  
She gently smiled at his gesture and he had to blink rapidly a few times in order to clear his vision.  
  
But then her expression turned serious again and she silently lowered her hand, stood up and walked towards the table standing in one of the corners of the small room. She took something out of a purse that hung over one of the other chairs, turned around and approached him again.  
  
"See, I knew I should have checked on you immediately as soon as Al told me that he found this here on one of the shelves in the morgue," she said and again knelt down in front of him.  
  
"Normally you don't just leave it behind - especially not after the last time when it actually rolled into the sink." She smiled at the memory. "You had to dismantle nearly the whole plumbing system to recover it."  
  
Then she took his hand into hers and slipped a golden band on his finger. It was a perfect fit.  
  
"There you go."  
  
He couldn't breath, couldn't move, could just stare at their joined hands, each wearing a simple golden ring. They matched.  
  
Then everything went black.  
  
~~*~~ 


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer, header etc. in part 1.  
  
~~*~~  
  
With Dreams Untold (6/7)  
by Eve (little_grey_woman42@yahoo.de)  
  
~~*~~  
  
Experiencing an eerie feeling of déjà-vu he once again opened his eyes to find himself lying face down on the ground. His suspicions were confirmed further when he looked around, identified the room and felt for the bump at the back of his head.  
  
He slowly moved and finally stood up, holding on to the sink on the wall.   
  
'"... when it actually rolled into the sink and ..."'  
  
His head jerked upwards as he suddenly remembered her words, remembered what he had just experienced.  
  
'Hallucinations. Fear, uncertainty, a hit on the back of my head - I was just hallucinating ...'  
  
He didn't realise he had started to move until he was through the doors of the morgue.  
  
He had to see her.  
  
Now.  
  
~~*~~  
  
Grissom hurried down the hallway. He'd already tried to page her but since she didn't answer right away he'd decided to go and look for her himself.  
  
He'd stopped at Greg's lab, an uneasy feeling spreading through him when he looked through the small window-pane. Two persons. Greg and Nick. He breathed a sigh of relief and opened the door.   
  
"... wanted to go to that new club because Sam told me that -"   
  
"Does anyone know where Sara is?"  
  
"Hey, welcome back, Gris!" Nick replied. "How was your vacation?"  
  
"Sara, Nick?" Grissom asked, impatience obvious in his voice.  
  
"Try the locker room. I think she may already be on her way out," Greg supplied helpfully. Grissom was already halfway through the door when he suddenly stopped and turned around again.  
  
He stared at Greg.   
  
"Sam?"   
  
"Huh?"  
  
"When I came into the room you were talking about -"   
  
"Oh, yeah, that's a girl I just met the other night. She -"   
  
"Samantha Jennings?" Grissom asked again, not sure what he would do if ...  
  
"Yeah, that's her name," Greg said hesitantly, surprise apparent in his voice. "But how did you -"   
  
"With a BA in physics and biology?"   
  
"Not yet. She - she's just started her first year, but how do you -" But Grissom was already out of the lab before he was able to finish his sentence. Confusion clearly written all over his face he turned around to face Nick. "How did he -"   
  
"Don't ask me, Greggo," Nick said, "don't ask me."  
  
~~*~~  
  
When he finally arrived at the locker room and found it empty, all energy suddenly seemed to leave him and he leaned heavily against one of the metal doors.  
  
What was he doing here?  
  
After he'd awoken again on the cold floor, his first impulse had been to go and look for Sara.   
  
But now ...   
  
A look into the future? Was that what he was supposed to believe - that this strange interlude had been really a look into the future? Into *their* future? That was crazy. Downright crazy. But perhaps that was it. Perhaps he *was* going crazy.  
  
'There has to be a rational explanation,' he thought, wearily rubbing his eyes underneath his glasses.  
  
Now that the cloud of pain that had numbed his ability to think was slowly but surely dissolving, he grasped for rationality, wanted desperately to get his hold on reality back. After all he was a man of science, a man who had learned to trust only in evidence.  
  
And there was plenty to back up a rational explanation, wasn't there?  
  
Uncertainty concerning his place in life, the possibility of permanently loosing his hearing looming above his head, his attempts at distancing himself from work - after the hit on the back of his head his mind just did a bit of extrapolation and provided him with a fascinating, albeit unreal and surreal dream.  
  
Cath and Warrick ... he both wanted them to be happy. Catherine deserved someone who would treat her better than Eddie, someone who saw her as the great and loving person he knew she was. Warrick adored Lindsey and Grissom knew that his instinct to protect Catherine was just as strong as his own. And as socially inapt as Grissom knew he sometimes tended to be, he wasn't blind. He'd always suspected that there might be the potential for something more between the two of them, for something that went beyond friendship. He just never assumed that they would actually act on it.  
  
And the girl's name, well Greg had probably been talking about her for quite some time and he'd possibly overheard one of his conversations and only remembered her name now.   
  
And Sara ... he didn't want her to stop being a part of his life. That much he was willing to admit to himself. He knew there was more to it, but ...  
  
'No. Don't go there.'  
  
There was no way his future would play out like that.  
  
No way.  
  
He couldn't and wouldn't risk what they had for the slight chance that ... And, and even if ... even if she would want him to be more than just a friend it wouldn't be fair to her, not now.  
  
It was too late.   
  
No, it had been just a dream. A cruel, taunting dream.  
  
'Hallucinations. Nothing more, nothing less. It's not going to happen. Get over it and move on.'  
  
Move on ... What if he really moved on? Right now? Packed his things and went away, made a clean break with his past, with his team, with everything? Leave everything behind before he would be forced to feel it all slip through his grasping hands ...  
  
It would probably be best.  
  
He closed his eyes and slowly slid down until he was sitting on the ground, back propped up against one of the lockers, his arms folded on his bend knees with his forehead resting on top of them.  
  
~~*~~ 


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer, header etc. in part 1.  
  
~~*~~  
  
With Dreams Untold (7/7)  
by Eve (little_grey_woman42@yahoo.de)  
  
~~*~~  
  
He was still in that position when she found him.  
  
She'd already been on the parking lot when she noticed that she had left her car keys behind. She knew that there really was a first time for everything when she looked at the looming building before her and realised that she had been glad to get out of the office and actually dreaded to go back inside.  
  
Somehow work just wasn't the same without Grissom.  
  
She missed him.  
  
It was as simple and at the same time complicated as that. She missed him. Missed his quirks, his quick mind, the challenges he provided, missed his presence beside her. Even when they weren't working together on a case, they passed each other during their shifts in the hallways and exchanged a few words or sometimes just a glance. Those were the small things she'd found herself looking forward to for quite some time now each day she woke up and got ready for work.  
  
So when she spotted him sitting huddled on the floor, she didn't know what to think. He wasn't supposed to be back until the day after tomorrow, was supposed to be on vacation, relaxing, not sitting there like ... like that.  
  
Even though she knew she would miss him, she'd actually been glad to hear his announcement two weeks ago that he would take a few days off, take some personal time. He hadn't been himself lately, appeared to be more distant than ever and she'd assumed that a break would be just the right thing for him.   
  
Sara would have taken a few days off herself if there wasn't so much work to do. One gruesome case solved and locked away into that one corner of her mind into which she never wanted to look again, there was always another one just around the bend, another case that needed her attention, another vic she soon felt obliged to.  
  
But seeing him like that she forgot her own weariness at once and quickly closed the door behind her.   
  
She approached him slowly, cautiously, lines of worry marring her face. When he didn't react to her approach, she reached out and said: "Grissom?" But before her hand was able touch his shoulder his head jerked up and the expression on his face caused her to pull her outstretched hand back immediately.   
  
What the hell had happened to him?  
  
"Sara," she barely heard him say with a strained voice, heard him say her name it as if he had to fight hard in order just to form the two syllables.  
  
"What's wrong?" she asked him gently and squatted down besides him.  
  
She saw his gaze flicker from her face to her hands then back again to her face.  
  
He seemed to search for something. Myriad contradicting emotions flickered in quick succession over his features, then relief, sadness, resignation. It was the resignation in his gaze that scared her most. That and the feeling that something was missing, something essential.   
  
She shuddered.  
  
But it was over as quickly as it had started and when she blinked, his face was as expressionless as it had been before and she wondered whether she'd actually seen anything at all. She saw him close his eyes and lean back against the locker, noticed him wince shortly when his head came in contact with the hard surface.  
  
"Gris?" she implored, not only wanting to know what had happened but also feeling the urge, the need for him to acknowledge that he was still ... him.  
  
"I ... I thought you were already gone," he said quietly and swallowed, his eyes still closed.  
  
"Yeah, well I've forgotten something I couldn't leave without and came back to pick it up," she said and looked at him, willing him to return her gaze.  
  
It seemed to work because his eyes immediately snapped open and he silently gazed at her. Not for the first time she wondered what he saw when he looked at her that way.   
  
She felt the sudden shift in him before she watched his eyes harden, saw him retreat back to that place where he'd been going to more and more often during the past couple of weeks. To that place where she couldn't seem to be able to reach him no matter how hard she tried.  
  
"I have to go," he informed her flatly and moved to get up from his place on the floor. She looked at him incredulously and stopped his movement by laying a hand on his arm.  
  
"You're not serious, are you? You can't just get up and leave me here without -"  
  
Again she was met with a look she couldn't quite place.   
  
"Look," she tried to reason with him, her grasp on his arm tightening involuntarily, "I just want to know what's wrong. And don't tell me it's nothing because obviously there *is* something wrong or you wouldn't be sitting here like that." When he didn't react she added pleadingly: "Talk to me. Please."  
  
He shrugged her hand off his arm and struggled to his feet. "You don't understand, I -"  
  
She quickly stood up as well and felt her confusion and worry turn into anger as she interrupted him: "Yes, I don't understand it. I don't understand what's happening to you, why you are closing yourself off from me, from everybody, why -"   
  
She suddenly stopped when she heard a quiet "thud" as something heavy hit the floor.  
  
It must have fallen out of the pocket of his trousers but Grissom didn't seem to notice. He kept staring at her and only followed her gaze when she looked down at the item that rolled towards her. It finally came to a halt right in front of her feet. She tilted her head and frowned, unable to identify the object from her perspective. Sara was about to reach down in order to pick it up when she heard a choked sound coming from the man in front of her.  
  
She looked up soon enough and saw him bend down, observed how he carefully, almost tenderly picked the red thing up and held it in his open palm. He drew in a shuddered breath and closed his hand around the oval object, holding on to it with dear life.  
  
"What is it, Grissom?" she asked, her anger already leaving her as quickly as it had appeared.  
  
He slowly tilted his head up and calmly met her eyes.   
  
She saw that he had to blink a few times in order to focus on her but when he finally did she felt herself completely drawn in by the intensity of his gaze. Grissom's blue eyes shone and he looked at her openly, his guard completely down. Her throat constricted painfully and her pulse speeded up when she realised the emotions they were revealing. They washed over her and she felt them engulf her like a blanket, felt warm and secure and loved.  
  
Sara smiled.  
  
And when she saw something twinkle brightly in his eyes, she suddenly knew what had been missing.  
  
Hope.  
  
~~*~~ 


End file.
